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Drawing on examples from navigation, object manipulation, and understanding structures such as the DNA double helix, it argues spatial knowledge is essential across architecture, engineering, dentistry, and medicine. The article also reviews challenges in US STEM readiness, including teacher shortages, underperformance in mathematics, and gaps in early, developmentally appropriate spatial and math instruction.",{"@graph":69,"@context":121},[70,84,104],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":35,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/healthcare/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/spatial-thinking-and-stem-how-playing-with-blocks-supports-early-math/591603/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":98,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":99,"interactionStatistic":100},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/spatial-thinking-and-stem-how-playing-with-blocks-supports-early-math/591603.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"supergirl","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":101,"interactionType":102,"userInteractionCount":4},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":103},"ViewAction",{"@type":105,"mainEntity":106},"FAQPage",[107,113,117],{"name":108,"@type":109,"acceptedAnswer":110},"What are spatial skills, and why do they matter for STEM?","Question",{"text":111,"@type":112},"Spatial skills help people visualize and navigate their surroundings, manipulate objects, and compute relationships in mind. The document links these abilities to STEM competencies and students’ later STEM trajectories.","Answer",{"name":114,"@type":109,"acceptedAnswer":115},"Which real-world fields rely heavily on spatial skills?",{"text":116,"@type":112},"Architecture, engineering, dentistry, and medicine are highlighted as areas where accurate spatial understanding is essential, including interpreting medical images and visualizing biological structures.",{"name":118,"@type":109,"acceptedAnswer":119},"What obstacles affect STEM readiness in schools?",{"text":120,"@type":112},"The document points to limited knowledge and resources for developmentally appropriate STEM and spatial learning, teacher shortages in math and science, and weak mathematics outcomes on international testing.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":123,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":125,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":127,"site_id":62},591603,1792072813,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":130},{"doc_id":127,"user_id":131,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":132,"doc_module":4,"category_id":34,"category_name":35,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":133,"file_id":134,"file_url":135,"file_type":136,"file_size":137,"view_count":4,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":29,"language":138,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":139,"faqs":140,"seo_title":141,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":128,"read_time":142},962088121634,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_9964176cb1d06d4a9deccf72a44ae3dc","ILLUSTRAT IONS BY SERGE BLOCH  \nSpatial Thinking and STEM  \nHow Playing with Blocks Supports Early Math  \nBy Laura Zimmermann, Lindsey Foster, Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, and Kathy Hirsh-Pasek  \nR  \nemember the last time you assembled a chest of drawers using that black-and-white IKEA diagram? Or the last time you found your way through a new city without your GPS? In these tasks—and many others—you are using  \nspatial skills. These spatial abilities pervade our everyday lives—whether we are walking to the elevator from a doctor’s office or deftly rotating our hot coffee cups to place them securely on our kitchen counter. The last 15 years have witnessed a quiet revolutionin our understanding of spatial skills,* and we are finding that these all-important STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) competencies are rooted in spatial knowledge. Where  \nLaura Zimmermann is an education researcher in SRI International’s Education Division. Lindsey Foster is a language and culture assistant in Madrid, Spain, and was formerly a lab manager in the Child’sPlay, Learning, and Development Lab atthe University of Delaware. Roberta Michnick Golinkoff is the Unidel H. Rodney Sharp Chair in the School of Education atthe University of Delaware, where she directs the Child’sPlay, Learning, and Development Lab. Kathy Hirsh-Pasek is the Stanley and Debra Lefkowitz Distinguished Faculty Fellow in the Department of Psychology at Temple University and is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.  \nwould our understanding of DNA be if James Watson and Francis Crick had not imagined a spatial structure like the double helix? Indeed, your spatial ability in high school is related to whether you become an engineer or a lawyer. Your background in spatial experiences predicts your STEM trajectory.  \nSpatial skills are the tools we use to visualize and navigate the world around us. Spatial skills allow us to manipulate objects in our environment and in our mind. They allow us to compute and store relations between objects, as when we remember we put our keys under the newspaper. Like gravity, we take these skills for granted, although we use them all the time.  \nArchitecture, engineering, dentistry, and medicine are just a few of the fields in which spatial skills are essential. A mistaken measurement on a bridge could be disastrous for commuters. Dentists and doctors routinely interpret X-rays that not only flip left and right, but also present soft tissues as gray and bone as lighter gray. In biology, our understanding of DNA depends on visualizing the double helix. Members of these professions, among others, rely on a foundation of strong spatial  \n*For more on spatial skills, see “Picture This” in the Summer 2010 issue of American Educator, [available at www.aft.org/sites/default/files/periodicals/Newcombe_1.pdf](available at www.aft.org/sites/default/files/periodicals/Newcombe_1.pdf), and “Seeing Relationships” in the Spring 2013 issue of American Educator, available [at www.aft.org/periodical/american-educator/spring-2013/seeing-relationships](at www.aft.org/periodical/american-educator/spring-2013/seeing-relationships).  \n22 AMERICAN EDUCATOR | WINTER 2018–2019  \nskills to accurately and successfully perform their work. So, if spatial skills are so important and pervasive, why are they so little discussed?  \nSpatial Skills and STEM Readiness  \nDespite important research findings on the impact of early spatial and math learning on later academic success, many schools lack the knowledge, resources, and capacity to focus on STEM and spatial learning in developmentally appropriate ways.  \nSTEM education in the United States presents a multifaceted challenge. One dimension involves a shortage of classroom teachers who are qualified to teach STEM subjects. According to the Department of Education, during the 2017–2018 school year, public schools in 48 states and the District of Columbia reported teacher shortages in math, and 43 states report","cbCaimAWdtJsLGnA","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaimAWdtJsLGnA","pdf",249916,"English","# Spatial Thinking and STEM\n## Spatial Skills and STEM Readiness","[{\"question\":\"What are spatial skills, and why do they matter for STEM?\",\"answer\":\"Spatial skills help people visualize and navigate their surroundings, manipulate objects, and compute relationships in mind. The document links these abilities to STEM competencies and students’ later STEM trajectories.\"},{\"question\":\"Which real-world fields rely heavily on spatial skills?\",\"answer\":\"Architecture, engineering, dentistry, and medicine are highlighted as areas where accurate spatial understanding is essential, including interpreting medical images and visualizing biological structures.\"},{\"question\":\"What obstacles affect STEM readiness in schools?\",\"answer\":\"The document points to limited knowledge and resources for developmentally appropriate STEM and spatial learning, teacher shortages in math and science, and weak mathematics outcomes on international testing.\"}]","Spatial Thinking and STEM - How Playing with Blocks Supports Early Math | PDF",15]